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Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

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Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#41

Post by ben509 »

tbwriting wrote: post #31
whiddershins wrote: post #4

may These articles really should qualify their claims more, especially in the headlines. Otherwise countless people absorb things semi-consciously as facts, rather than hypotheses that may have some data to support them.

Truly curious: do you think every article based on a study showing strong evidence for something should have a title that implies "it can go either way"? Personally I would trust readers to click on the article and decide for themselves. Otherwise, it's a bit infantilizing, no?

> Personally I would trust readers to click on the article...

This is already contrary to all available evidence.

Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#43

Post by egypturnash »

whytaka wrote: post #32
sumtechguy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing that worked well for me was to uninstall the attention grabbing apps. Helped immensely with battery life too :) Pretty much all that is left on my phone is 'augmented reality' sort of applications. Translate, maps, 'what song is that', barcode scanner, etc. Anything that pops a notification for something I do not really need to know about right now gets uninstalled pretty quickly. I then use the actual webs…

The problem for me is the browser. Unfortunately iOS doesn’t let you put safari into restricted apps on screen time. I’ve managed to train myself to regard my computer mostly as a work machine but that just means my phone is my mindless browsing machine.

I just checked and was able to set a time limit for Safari on both ios13.3 and 14.4.1. Type "safari" in the search box at the top of the list of categories that comes up when you go to set a new limit, pull the list down to reveal the search box if it doesn't show up at first.

Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#45

Post by brohoolio »

_xnmw wrote: post #22

I doubt the mere presence of the phone itself is distracting, but rather it's the fact that putting it somewhere far (or allowing it to be taken from you) requires a conscious intention and is sufficiently absurd that it triggers the novelty feeling, which helps your focus. I just put my phone away in the closet. Perhaps this will become part of my new "focus" ritual.

I find that the mere presence of the phone is distracting. It's subtle and I didn't notice it until I physically started putting it in another room. I don't mindlessly pick it up and opening an app.

Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#46

Post by mszcz »

beckingz wrote: post #18
Swizec wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you spend your time marketing your self to others and letting people know your accomplishments, or do you spend the time doing work that will benefit others? I like the luck surface area analogy for this. Take a rectangle. Side A is "Quality of work". Side B is "How many people know about it". The surface area – A*B – is your luck and opportunity. If you do amazing work and nobody knows about it, your luck is ze…

The conjoined rectangle of success.

That just made my day!

Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#47

Post by moneywoes »

whytaka wrote: post #32
sumtechguy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing that worked well for me was to uninstall the attention grabbing apps. Helped immensely with battery life too :) Pretty much all that is left on my phone is 'augmented reality' sort of applications. Translate, maps, 'what song is that', barcode scanner, etc. Anything that pops a notification for something I do not really need to know about right now gets uninstalled pretty quickly. I then use the actual webs…

The problem for me is the browser. Unfortunately iOS doesn’t let you put safari into restricted apps on screen time. I’ve managed to train myself to regard my computer mostly as a work machine but that just means my phone is my mindless browsing machine.

Have the same issue. Like I deleted Instagram on my phone but I’ll just use the web version. Also, I think Android’s digital well being let’s you restrict websites on the browser

Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#48

Post by chrisbigelow »

In my experience, not having the opportunity/ability to access my phone has been the only solution that truly lets me disconnect and focus. I've been working on a locking wireless charger to keep your phone out of sight and access, I'm looking to launch soon on Indiegogo: https://pausbox.com/

Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#49

Post by raghuveerdotnet »

I feel "Focus" as a function of overwhelming want or overwhelming need is a better proposition than as a function of tips and tricks. I've had times when despite all the raging distractions I've got the work done because I was so invested in it and there have been times when despite being in a perfectly isolated, no distraction environment, I have failed to get the work done because there was no real urgent need for it to be done, intrinsic or otherwise.

I would say work on things based on constraints, that are beyond the artificial boundary of productivity tricks, like an overwhelming desire for action or an imminent deadline from an external enforcing agent; differentiate between want, want-to-want, and have-to-want; and mainly rest well, for energy management is key in working well.

Re: Phones and apps reduce your ability to focus even when they don’t distract you

#50

Post by waihtis »

EGreg wrote: post #5

They tested the “brain drain” hypothesis that claims the brain has a limited capacity of cognitive resources, and the mere presence of a potential distractor can occupy some of those resources which undercut cognitive performance. Sounds like something straight out of Conan Doyle https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/lessons-from... "You see," he explained, "I consider that a man's brain originally is like…

This phenomenom is at times called the green lumber fallacy: https://fs.blog/2016/11/green-lumber-fallacy/
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